63 Comments

One issue with this analysis, Zeke, is that there are several flavors of El Nino and at least 2 indices are needed to properly cover a good part of their variance. e.g.

Trenberth, K. E., and D. P. Stepaniak, 2001: Indices of El Niño evolution. J. Climate., 14, 1697-1701 [PDF]

Not sure the link to the pdf worked: it is available on my web site.

Also see:

Global temperature rises in steps – here’s why we can expect a steep climb this year and next. 12 July 2023

https://theconversation.com/global-temperature-rises-in-steps-heres-why-we-can-expect-a-steep-climb-this-year-and-next-209385

Thanks for the analysis

Kevin

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Thanks Kevin! I've looked at NOAA's ONI as well and it results in largely the same set of ENSO events (though interestingly 2023/2024 is only a moderately strong El Nino with ~1.5C elevated SSTs in the ENSO region under that metric).

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Yes, the issues are the different types of El Nino, so-called eastern Pacific and Central Pacific, and the annual cycles. Earlier events were eastern Pacific and developed westward into central Pacific. Then there were several that started in the central Pacific and developed to the east, with a smaller signal off the S. American coast. Turns out the mean annual cycle has components of both. So every event is made up of these 3 ingredients: the mean annual cycle (somewhat different patterns each month of the year), plus whether it develops eastwards or westwards. Somewhat random weather events can shift things by a couple of months. Because the precipitation depends more on the total SST rather than the anomaly the variety can be surprisingly large. And that it without considering the extratropical teleconnections.

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Nice analysis.

I do question how an El Nino most similar to the 1965-6 would cause this level of sustained warming.

I'm still wondering if the HTHH is the underlying cause, but I'll wait till next year for the SPARK papers to be published before I totally discount this.

There could be some other tipping point/catastrophe(*) that we're just not aware of. It will be interesting to see how 'sticky' this temperature spike continues to be.

(*) By catastrophe, I'm referring to Catastrophy Theory in mathematics. The idea that, in some non-linear systems, a gradual change in one variable (e.g. CO2) could cause an abrupt and irreversible change in another (e.g. temperature).

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No matter if El Niño or La Niña the Earth is gaining a huge amount of solar energy equivalent to over 11 Hiroshima bombs per SECOND (James Hansen in his 2012 TED talks quoted data to say over 4 per second 12 years ago; the heat gain is accelerating). This will not end well for civilization as agricultural output fails to keep up with global needs.

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Thanks, as always, for these posts. I have been using the ClimateReanalyzer (CR) site to watch what has been happening to the daily global (non-polar) SSTs. One thing that I began taking note of beginning in 2023 was an apparent "banding" (stratification?) in the data. ( At the moment, there are 3 clear bands in the data. See 2nd image, here: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/18fMuKUTXy/ .) If I use the CR site to "scrub through" the yearly data, it is rather clear that these bands correlate to time –– the higher the band's average SST, the higher (more recent) their average year. I'm not a scientist, nor do I have access to the underlying data the CR site is using for their graphs. Still, I have a general idea of how systems behave and what I'm seeing in the graphs is a clear "ratcheting up" of SSTs instead of the relatively steady climb in values one might expect. My read of what the SST graph shows is that this ratcheting is becoming better defined and quicker, with 2023-2024 being the start of a 4th band. The ratcheting, itself, doe not surprise me. I would expect a complicated system such as this to have a gradient with local minima – places where the value would settle until a strong enough force pushed it out. This would explain the banding. What, though, is doing the forcing? And is the ratcheting up we can see purely a result of this increasing force or more a result of the topography of the gradient? Thoughts?

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@Mal Adapted. I cannot seem to reply to the appropriate comment.

The "intellectual imprinting" I allude to is something other than confirmation bias or its stablemate motivated reasoning. There is a word in psychology but I can't remember or find it. The churches/religions know to get 'em young get 'em first. It's worked very well for the oil companies too - advertise from the start some famous scientists reckon climate science is uncertain/not-real-science (Fred Seitz et al). Now Clauser has stuck his oar in. Old age is a curse!

I agree all climate deniers should be answered, mainly for the benefit of other readers, but also that's the way to learn the "gotchas" they find on their crank sites.

It's frightening that so many young people choose to avoid the news and learning what's going on around them, it's just too hard to bear. Hardly surprising when US universities called in the police to bash peaceful students protesting America's participation in Israel's massacre of Palestinians and destruction of Gaza.

I can read the New York Times here via Auckland Libraries, so I still can read your link even if it's paywalled. Thanks again and I'm sure the blog owners appreciate your input.

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Thanks Dennis. Before you click reply under a comment to respond to it specifically, try sorting the thread by "oldest" first. That at least presents you with everyone's comments in chronological order.

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@jakerake

The hockey stick has been replicated several times over. Furthermore, a Kiwi professor at Cambridge, Michael Kelly FRS, who is tied up with the climate denial outfit GWPF, was on the committee that investigated the "climategate" and found no wrongdoing. I have had a bit to do with Kelly, also another Cambridge FRS who went to the same university here as I did. You gotta choose who you're going to believe, even if you're a physics professor - like Happer, Clauser. Giaever, Lindzen. Human frailty, eh, "Science progresses one funeral at a time" - Max Planck.

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"The uncertainties are much wider – ranging from 0C to 0.5C – reflecting the larger sample size and inclusion of more moderate El Niño events."

That is because you have chosen to use 2-sigma intervals which are not representative of 95% certainty for such small populations. For 5 El Niños, you should use 2.571, for 14 - 2.145, and for 19 - 2.093 (as follows from Student's t-distribution).

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Don't anyone tell Don John Trump. It's all ;a big scam according to him.

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Good stuff. How do you think the integral of the area under the curves would compare and would it tell you anything useful?

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Thats an interesting idea, though it would only be meaningful if the approach used to detrend the data actually fully removed the anthropogenic signal. E.g. if there was some non-linear change in forcings that resulted in a jump in temperatures unrelated to ENSO it would throw things off! Though thats also a bit of the case in my current analysis as well.

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To complete the thought, dividing by the integral of time gives the average delta T for the cycle which is proportional to the total energy associated with the cycle. It could be interesting to see if that is scaling with increased GMST or if there is at least a consistent trend. "Just" a thought....

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Climate forcing feedbacks definitely Zeke! Unfortunately these will remain unaccounted for because most climate scientists have the hydrology and water cycle of the planet all figured out. Much of these figures are not based on regional or on the ground data measurements.

God for bid if scientists got up to the subarctic to get precipitation and temperature changes and chart it out from the early 1900s to the present. But this could be gathered from existing weather stations throughout Siberian and Canadian regions up there. There are very strong reasons why the heat balance and budget up there has changed. Historically a cooler dry region, but in the past decades has been heating up and getting wetter and more humid.

It has a lot to do with the large proliferation of mega dams from 1950s-1990s for hydro generation and their "Strict Flow Regimens".

Along the northern Siberian plateau just about all the major rivers serving the Arctic region have been dammed sending river waters that have flowed freely for thousands of years now inland creating sea-size impoundments. Stagnant waters sit for months in the summer warming & heating these regions. Evaporation(GHG) rates now have shot up greatly. Waters are drawn back only in winter for hydro generation, then releasing waters well below top of dam where waters is 39 F to make hydro-e , insures a temperature between water and air to be so great that unlimited clouds of water vapor(GHG) spill in the entire regions as water now can flow for almost 200 miles downstream without freezing.

Canada is doing exactly the same thing as the Russians. Needless to say the Northern Hemispheres water cycle and heat polluted budget has accumulated so much over these decades that Scientists are still dumb founded.

This is a regional issue which has changed one of the most climate sensitive regions on this planet. The heat budget maintained in the Arctic regions has always been border line freezing

With the introduction of dams releasing warmer waters in the winter, in such a sensitive region, the Arctic Ocean cannot refreeze the way it used to during winter. Rivers must flow free ASAP or you can kiss a livable climate goodby.

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I am interested in getting to the truth on the weather trends as it relates to climate change and my understanding is you must use 30 years of weather before it can be a climate trend.

Based on this the work done by Christy and Spencer is worthwhile, and they are part of the “Realist” end of climate science, but I suggest we should review that outlook.

Here is a good summary..

John Christy: Climate Change is Not a Crisis | Tom Nelson Pod #260

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwYVyU_q9Uo&t=403s

This kind of work has developed a growing consensus at both government and voter level in many western nations that NetZero is unnecessary, technologically unattainable, economically unviable and extremely foolish. And especially as the “rest” of the global economies continue to do nothing anyway. It fits with the notion of focused adaption for “high risk areas” and will allow us to get on with prosperity using the power of Fossil fuels.

Its very clear there are now two opposing scientific factions suggesting vastly different climate policy action.

More at …. https://nigelsouthway.substack.com/p/no-netzero

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There really is only one scientific "faction", comprising the global peer community of climate specialists: Christy and Spencer represent a repudiation of science's most basic principles. The two of them, colleagues at UAH, are known for their rejection of the overwhelming consensus of their scientific peers (theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/apr/06/revealing-interview-with-top-contrarian-climate-scientists). They are both associated with the Cornwall Alliance, a group of religiously-motivated climate science deniers, that has received dark money funding (desmog.com/cornwall-alliance-stewardship-creation). Spencer, although not Christy, has signed the Evangelical Declaration on Global Warming, promulgated by the Cornwall Alliance (cornwallalliance.org/evangelical-declaration-on-global-warming), which explicitly rejects the specialist consensus in favor of theological dogma. These two faith-based denialists happen to have formal credentials in the climate-science peer community, demonstrating how even with scientific training and discipline, you can still fool yourself if your primary cognitive motivator demands it. Curiously, at least one prominent Evangelical scientist, Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, is an articulate communicator and defender of the climate-science consensus. Y'all make of that what you will.

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Mal.. We are a long way past the time when so called “climate deniers” could be quickly cancelled and logistically silenced with this kind of non scientific political-religious dialogue that attacks the credibility and integrity of scientific participants rather than the scientific facts, theories, and conclusions presented.

We now have strong and professional “climate realist” organizations that are using scientific methods to construct conclusions and suggest policies, and they are getting listened too far more by the new western national governments than the failed so called official sources..

In some ways this refocus toward climate realism is because the so called “official Climate alarmist” organizations have lost credibility because they have demonstrated both poor science and some of the very political tactics you subscribe too. A good example is the Mann global temperature hockey stick that was fabricated to force the notion of unprecedented climate change caused by humans. There are many other examples, and its clear that these activists have adjusted and manipulated the science, the media reports, and the proposed policies, to ensure compatibility with the political narrative. This is the point made by Koonin in his book Unsettled and demonstrated how the IPCC scientific sections were heavily rewritten as policy sections to meet the climate emergency narrative.

These Climate realist may also call themselves realists or sceptics and none would deny that the climate is changing or warming to some degree, and some agree that we may have participated in increasing CO2, but based on data have declared CO2 not to be a pollutant, and that we do NOT have a climate emergency or crisis that requires the death wish of NetZero.

You have subscribed to Desmog which is a propaganda rag and continues to be a discredited joke.

And the notion that climate realists are in the pay of bad actors is a joke when you realize that almost all of the scientists in traditional scientific organizations have become subjugated by funding to maintain the narrative and keep their jobs ….with only a few exceptions.

The point that you subscribe to the notion of a scientific consensus shows your lack of scientific bearing as its part of the operating practice in science that there never is a consensus only agreed hard earned laws that even then can still be questioned.

I happen to know many climate scientist and I personally know Spencer and Christy as they are part of CLINTEL https://clintel.org/ where I am also a contributing member, but more on industrial advisory than hard climate science, but from my study of the situation I strongly suggest you need to revisit the data for yourself. and I suggest my Substack paper and the Christy presentation.

If you then have scientific questions lets proceed to discuss , but you drawing conclusions from the frozen narrative you have used just aint science matey!

https://nigelsouthway.substack.com/p/no-netzero

John Christy: Climate Change is Not a Crisis | Tom Nelson Pod #260

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwYVyU_q9Uo&t=403s

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Here's a deal: I'll go with the Royal Society, National Academy of Sciences, American Association for the Advancement of Science and every scientific institution on the planet and you and keep Spencer and Christy - who were so wrong in their calculations several scientists had to teach them how to suck eggs.

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Which calculations?

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Ok.. let me review....

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Good cites, Dennis, all sources I for one consider sufficiently credible within their media categories. jakerake promises to review, but if we're going to reject the credibility of his favorite blogs, he can't fairly be expected to respect our favorites either. For those who require peer-reviewed publication in scientific venues of record regarding the kerfuffle, the earliest I could find by drilling down through your links is Santer et al. 2003, "Influence of Satellite Data Uncertainties on the Detection of Externally Forced Climate Change"(science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.1082393).

Edit: here's a more recent (2017) peer-reviewed article by Mears and Wentz, compilers of the RSS independent satellite temperature dataset: "A Satellite-Derived Lower-Tropospheric Atmospheric Temperature Dataset Using an Optimized Adjustment for Diurnal Effects" (journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/30/19/jcli-d-16-0768.1.xml)

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BTW, jakerake: you just accused Michael Mann of fraud, long after previous charges were decisively judged false. Reanimating that undead meme doesn't make it any more true. Good thing you used a pseudonym. The last guy who published that claim was ordered to pay Dr. Mann $1 million (cbc.ca/news/world/us-trial-mann-defamation-steyn-simberg-1.7110203) in punitive damages.

Wait - is that what you meant by "logistically silenced"? Nah. You're just another pseudonymous internet rando, not a syndicated pundit who libels for a living (AFAIK). I doubt Mann gives a rip what "jakerake" says. OTOH, Mark Steyn tried the "nobody listens to li'l old me" defense without success.

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We have discredited his hockey stick graph with revised scientific data that is available at CLINTEL and many other sources ... If he wants to take it personally that’s his problem. But science should always be open to question, and his sensitivity makes me wonder what else may be erroneous.?

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This is worth saying again on its own here:

You're fooling yourself if you think CLINTEL has discredited Mann's hockey stick (sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277379122001688). As for "If he wants to take [your accusation of fraud] personally that’s his problem", that was true until it crossed the line between "question" and "libel". A court has already found the accusation libelous. Mann has demonstrated the legal right to make it your problem. You've got nothing but bravado and pseudonymity to protect you. Wake up!

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jakerake: "We are a long way past the time when so called “climate deniers” could be quickly cancelled and logistically silenced with this kind of non scientific political-religious dialogue that attacks the credibility and integrity of scientific participants rather than the scientific facts, theories, and conclusions presented."

"Cancelled"? Seriously? I can't stop you from posting here, only the moderators can. And how would "logistically silenced" actually work? I don't even know where you live! I can, however, spot the pedestrian rhetorical tactics of mercenary denialism. And pseudonymously or not, I don't claim credentials I haven't earned, but I can distinguish between a National Academy of Sciences report by a distinguished panel of widely-acknowledged experts, and a Forbes OpEd by a professional disinformer hoping to forestall collective intervention in fossil fuel producer profits. FWIW, you've got skills.

jakerake: "We now have strong and professional “climate realist” organizations that are using scientific methods to construct conclusions and suggest policies, and they are getting listened too far more by the new western national governments than the failed so called official sources.."

Wow. "...they are getting listened too by the new western national goverments". Sure, they'll find ready implementers in the kakistocracy Americans just elected on a 2% popular majority. 100% of us got the government 49.9% of us deserves. So? The global community of publishing climate specialists, as ably represented by Dr. Hausfather, established a superior claim to climate realism 200 years ago. The centuries-long, international enterprise of science doesn't offer absolute assurance about anthing, but it's the only institution for accumulating verified, useful knowledge our culture has evolved that's more successful than divination with a sheep's liver. It's the "official source" because its first rule is not to fool yourself, and you are the easiest to fool. Just because your ostensible, alternative "peers" are happy to let you fool yourself, doesn't make you a realist on any topic. A genuine skeptic considers the source, and follows the money! Tell us, do you think Charles Koch is just a patriotic American? Even Forbes, long the "capitalist's tool", is skeptical (forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2012/12/05/inside-the-koch-empire-how-the-brothers-plan-to-reshape-america).

One thing you pseudoskeptics always get wrong, though, is the argumentum ad hominem. Spencer and Christy's claims are not being attacked simply because of our knowledge of their explicit rejection, for theological reasons, of the multiple lines of verified evidence for anthropogenic climate change. From the Evangelical Declaration on Global Warming (cornwallalliance.org/evangelical-declaration-on-global-warming):

"We believe Earth and its ecosystems—created by God’s intelligent design and infinite power and sustained by His faithful providence —are robust, resilient, self-regulating, and self-correcting, admirably suited for human flourishing, and displaying His glory. Earth’s climate system is no exception. Recent global warming is one of many natural cycles of warming and cooling in geologic history...

"We deny that Earth and its ecosystems are the fragile and unstable products of chance, and particularly that Earth’s climate system is vulnerable to dangerous alteration because of minuscule changes in atmospheric chemistry. Recent warming was neither abnormally large nor abnormally rapid. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human contribution to greenhouse gases is causing dangerous global warming."

No, Spencer's and Christy's claims are rejected because a large majority of their professional peers have long agreed there's no convincing evidence of God's intelligent design, or Cthulhu's either; but there *is* convincing evidence that humans are causing dangerous global warming, that's already costing money, homes, livelihoods, and lives around the world; and that those costs will mount as long as the large-scale anthropogenic transfer of fossil carbon to the atmosphere continues. Spencer and Christy's contrary claims have long since been considered on their scientific merits, and decisively rejected by their professional peers in aggregate. That's how science actually works, you know. Anyone who tells you "consensus isn't science" is trying to fool you, because consensus is essential to scientific progress. Those who aren't members of the international specialist peer community need only ask themselves what's more likely: that more than 90% (why quibble over how much more) of its members are wrong and Spencer and Christy are right, or the reverse.

Now that we've rejected Spencer's and Christy's arguments on their merits, it's not ad hominem to wonder what drives them to persist in betraying the basic principle of science: namely, to follow the evidence where it leads, even if it means abandoning one's theistic presuppositions.

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Look…Unless you have some science facts or data or concepts to discuss and not this theological and ad hominem clap-trap I will assume we have a clear understanding of each others position and we don’t have need for further discussion…

However, be aware that what is settled is the resolution being solidified in many new western government policies that based on just about every environmental metric trending low risk we must assume we don’t have a climate emergency.

And based on the low % impact of CO2 on the climate forcing, then FF CO2 emissions are of low concern and we can accelerate our use of FF to provide affordable energy and prosperity , although improving other forms of pollution on air sea and land is an ongoing goal.

Plus, until we have climate models that are fit for purpose at predicting the climate outlook we should just focus on climate adaption. Its clear that NetZero is unnecessary, technologically unattainable, economically unviable and extremely foolish. And a waste of our wealth, and we need to redeploy our policies to only consider focused adaptation to a naturally warming planet.

Its very clear that the UN and COPS will be struggling to get support as these realities unfold.

Again, I am quite happy to explain the science behind these directions if you want to listen.

More at …. https://nigelsouthway.substack.com/p/no-netzero

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Well, it's clear you haven't read my links for comprehension, and I won't take the time to watch your videos: I can read faster than that, assuming I have reason to trust the source. Having seen it all before and followed the money, I don't trust yours. Why would I? As you can tell, I have strong opinions, just like you, but I'll walk away from this reciprocal monologuing if you will. You can even have the last word, if you'll just answer the question in my ending sentence plainly. Otherwise, only Zeke or Prof. Dessler can declare it over. I've got lots to say about your claims, I'm getting enough likes to keep me going even if you're not paying attention, and there's always the hypothetical uncommitted lurker!

The original claim of scientific "fact" you made is:

"NetZero is unnecessary, technologically unattainable, economically unviable and extremely foolish. And a waste of our wealth".

Your "data" are presented in a youtube video. The knowledge I trust appears first in print, much if it now online of course. Do you think modern climate science is no longer formally published in its historically established venues? This blog isn't one, however well-qualified its authors are, and neither are Nigel Southway's substack or Christy's youtube pitch. I don't have any knowledge Dr. Hausfather doesn't, and by convention here we're expected to link all scientific fact claims to primary, peer-reviewed documents. Professional journalism, which has a different social function than science but overlapping methods, has its own established standards of intersubjective verification: see the Interactive Media Bias Chart (adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart) for a quantitative sorting on two axes.

Nor has CLINTEL actually discredited Mann's hockey stick in authoritative peer-reviewed venues. Indeed, that historical temperature curve, within quantified confidence limits, has been replicated independently multiple times. Here's a direct link to a peer-reviewed article in the professional scientific journal "Quaternary Science Reviews" (established 1982): sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277379122001688.

As for "If he wants to take [your accusation of fraud] personally that’s his problem", that was true until it crossed the line between "question" and "libel". A court has already found the accusation libelous. Mann has demonstrated the legal right to make it your problem. You've got nothing but bravado and pseudonymity to protect you. Wake up.

Next: "And based on the low % impact of CO2 on the climate forcing, then FF CO2 emissions are of low concern and we can accelerate our use of FF to provide affordable energy and prosperity."

Well, since the overwhelming consensus of trained, mutually disciplined climate specialists worldwide in the 21st century is that CO2 emissions are of high "concern", i.e. net aggregate cost, now and rising on decadal timescales, claims to the contrary are extraordinary. It's not up to anyone here to refute them, it's your obligation to support them in established peer-reviewed venues, enough to overturn the current consensus iin those venues. Then you can link to them here! But if you think you're Zeke's professional peer, you're sadly fooling yourself.

I'm not done yet: oh hell, no. The only "concept" you've offered is to mock the unique philosophy, history, culture and practice of the Earth Sciences, that have bestowed so many tangible benefits on so many ordinary people. Their knowledge wouldn't be cumulative or self-correcting without peer consensus, no matter what your alleged friends tell you: "If I have seen further it is by standing on ye shoulders of Giants" (I. Newton). The "over 1,100 scientists and professionals" who signed CLINTEL's "World Climate Declaration" are a negligible fraction of the global community of climate-specialist peers, and many signatories have long records of reflexive, pseudo-skeptical contrarianism (science.org/content/article/white-house-recruits-researchers-adversarial-climate-science-review): only deniers would call them Giants. Your 'strong and professional “climate realist” organizations' are K Street white-shoe law offices and Beltway consulting firms offering bespoke "scientific" authority to anyone with the funds to hire it (insideclimatenews.org/news/23082022/experts-debunk-viral-post-claiming-1100-scientists-say-theres-no-climate-emergency). Their corporate mission is to fool you. I can speak to that from my own extended education and subsequent 30-yr career in federal laboratories, but I'd link to more copious, redundant documentation of the phenomenon if I thought you'd follow up. You write like one of those fink-tank phonies, but your understanding of how "intersubjective verification" actually works in science is manifestly at the cargo-cult level, and you're transparently determined to keep it there! You sure sound like you're working for the petro-plutocracy, but the counter arguments still obtain whether you're a paid useful idiot or a motivated volunteer.

All that said, I refute your initial claim thus: the human toll climate change has taken to date, not only in money but in homes, livelihoods and lives over and above what would be lost if not for anthropogenic "greenhouse" (a limited though evocative metaphor) emissions, surely counts as a crisis to the victims. Here's a peer-reviewed print article in an established venue of record, to back that up: nature.com/articles/s41467-023-41888-1. From the abstract:

"We find that US$143 billion per year of the costs of extreme events is attributable to climatic change. The majority (63%), of this is due to human loss of life."

IOW, that you and your friends haven't suffered much yet doesn't mean nobody has. Surely you're aware the principle reason we're talking about this here, is that anthropogenic climate change is fundamentally an economic justice issue. You emphasized your concern about "our" wealth. Whose wealth? Yours and fossil-fuel investors', or the documented millions of climate change victims to date who've been left without any, making them involuntary third parties to your private transactions on the energy market? That may not matter to you, but I, for one, have no doubt it does to them. It's sad you don't see that. If you say the aggregate cost to date is zero, then nothing I say can persuade you otherwise. If you acknowledge a non-zero cost, is it merely that the cumulative cost to date isn't high enough yet to justify collective action to drive the global economy to net-zero as rapidly as politically possible? Then please answer this question, if you will: how much more aggregate money and grief would be too much for you?

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Thanks, Dennis! Good to know I'm not just talking to an AI!

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The Guardian is the least likely source I would refer to for information or views on climate change!

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You're entitled to your opinion, but the venerable Graun rates as relatively unbiased and reliable by reasonably objective measures (adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart). What do you think the linked article gets wrong regarding Christy's and Spencer's reputations among their scientific peers? And how do you feel about the New York Times (nytimes.com/2014/07/16/us/skeptic-of-climate-change-john-christy-finds-himself-a-target-of-suspicion.html)? It falls in about the same place as the Guardian on that Interactive Media Bias Chart. Hey, argue with the chart's developer, one Vanessa Otero, not with me.

Then there's NASA's chief climate scientist, Gavin Schmidt (realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2023/03/how-not-to-science). He's pretty much the horse's mouth, as it were, and a more disciplined, unbiased principle investigator can't be found. Whatever Christy's and Spencer's cognitive motivators, they're evidently willing to fool themselves about climate science.

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I really wish the ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis data went back to

1900 which of course it doesn't. Then we would have a larger sample set and a little higher confidence. But I think even with only data from 1940 we can say that late 2024 is an outlier with ominous implications. I'm not sure of the loop feedbacks or forcing mechanisms. I'm fairly certain that the climate is in a very rapid and dynamic state of change where there is no stable "new normal" and predictions of climate even five years in the future become difficult. Meta-analysis of predictions five years from now may bear this out.

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Do not take my above remarks as climate change and global warming denialism! The climate is rapidly changing and catastrophic warming is ongoing.. most of it anthropogenic. Biodiversity is being effected, an enormous number of species are being lost, the cryosphere is rapidly shrinking with both poles and Greenland melting, the AMOC weakening. We are handing to our children a much reduced world and the prime villian is the fossil fuel sector of the economy and we, the enablers of it. There are simply too many of us.

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To Bernie:

I tried to reply to your latest comment but was unable.

A couple points to consider:

1. Some of the research conducted on krill was conducted around 10 - 15 years ago when 1000 ppm by 2100 was considered within the realm of possibility, https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3530562/ .

2. Ocean acidification is a real concern and research conducted on species like krill today helps inform our understanding of the past when levels of CO2 and earth's temperatures were much higher and caused the extinction of life, including simple life in the ocean, e.g., https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2024/09/phantastic-job/#ITEM-25674-0 .

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Michael: Thanks for the comments, Michael, with which I agree. There are sadly a number of so-called reputable scientists who are quite happy to be climate activists and cleverly but dishonestly provide commentary on aspects of the climate change issue. For example, some Australian scientists working the impacts of climate change in Antarctica placed krill in waters that contained varying levels of dissolved CO2 (and hence varying levels of pH), with the worst-case being water carrying 1000ppm CO2. At the current rate of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere, 1000ppm will not be reached for some 300 years,by which time it's not unreasonable to believe workable and effective solutions to climate change will be found. So why look at a totally unrealistic scenario so far into the future? Scaremongering with the goal of getting more taxpayer money for ongoing research into the impacts of CO2 on krill! My criticism of the El Nino research paper is that it covers too short a time frame and in my view has given an incomplete understanding of climate perturbations caused by as El Nino. Why? I have my suspicions.

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To Mal Adapted

I just see an inability for you to review information provided and a combative response using a lot of “here-say” legal-eze and not much science.

If you have some science to review lets do that.

I will leave you with a response to your questions and will move on to more productive discussions elsewhere..

Our position is that the science has been subjugated and corrupted by always working toward a consensus to support a climate emergency agenda that does not exist.

We see only a need for focused adaption with coping trends continuing to improve to manage weather extremes with the use of technology and the continued use of Fossil fuels.

We do not see any justification for climate mitigation with no predictive capability with models to change that position.

We see the cost of NetZero to be an order of many magnitudes outside its range of usefulness to cope with a non-emergency.

We agree the need to further review the climate science but in the future this must be conducted in a far more non-political manner as recommended by CLINTEL.

And lastly with the new western governments we will be undertaking new policies with a withdraw from the UN initiatives, and avoiding NetZero and all its huge mistakes, so we can get the western world back on a track for climate realism and gain back our prosperity.

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"I just see an inability for you to review information provided and a combative response using a lot of “here-say” legal-eze and not much science...

"Our position is that the science has been subjugated and corrupted by always working toward a consensus to support a climate emergency agenda that does not exist."

Talk about a political manner. You just poisoned the entire well of natural science since no later than 1824. You therefore have no way to know when you're fooling yourself. It's not actually about science with you, it's about self-enhancing conspiracist ideation. Thanks for making that clear.

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Sorry, but the scientific claims you're making are contradicted by a nearly-complete majority of Spencer's and Christy's professional peers. That makes your claims "extraordinary" by Sagan's definition. This isn't a court of law: extraordinary scientific claims are not considered innocent until proven guilty, and the onus is on you to support them with links to authoritative peer-reviewed sources. I, OTOH, am claiming nothing that isn't already consensus knowledge. My links support the consensus arguments. You'd be familiar with them if you were Dr. Hausfather's peer. I'm not either, and I'm not obliged to review information I have prior knowledge is untrustworthy. You need to persuade me here - update my priors, so to speak - if you want me to review anything. Back to you.

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"Our position is that the science has been subjugated and corrupted by always working toward a consensus to support a climate emergency agenda that does not exist."

Well, Roy Spencer, at least, believes his God wouldn't let a climate emergency exist. Your claims of subjugation and corruption, OTOH, are pure paranoid conspiracism, without basis in verifiable fact (wsj.com/articles/what-drives-conspiracism-11622759795). Pluralizing your position doesn't make it any more true. Spinoza's God help the rest of us!

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Me: "You'd be familiar with them if you were Dr. Hausfather's peer. I'm not either"

D'oh. Too terse. I'm not Zeke's professional peer, but I was trained for a research career until I realized I didn't want to work that hard for a living, had a career in support roles in Earth Sciences laboratories, and been obsessively following climate-related science since 1988, when the world learned about anthropogenic global warming. I'm not comprehensively literate in the peer-reviewed record, but I claim sufficient scientific meta-literacy (web.archive.org/web/20130213192911/http://blog.chron.com/climateabyss/2013/02/scientific-meta-literacy) in this domain to know genuine skepticism from motivated denial. And the Internet never forgets!

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While more accurate data prior to 1940 is understandably lacking, nonetheless the 84 years between 1940 and today can hardly be considered to be an objective period for assessing climate and weather changes around the planet. For example, 1940 was the start of WW2 when much industrial activity was curtailed and hence CO2 emissions reduced. With the planet coming out of an ice age starting some 8000 years ago and even with the Little Ice Age only ending in about 1850, a much longer time frame is required if an assessment of the unusualness of any aspect of our weather (or climate) is to be taken seriously.

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Earth's warming and the part played by CO2 is measured and beyond question, this paper is just looking at the recent El Niño some unexplained warming.

Incidentally prior to the Industrial Revolution Earth was cooling. The Little Ice Age was not an Ice Age. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age

Living in Australia I would have thought looking out the window would be enough to convince you the science is right and you are up the creek without the water. But aren't you a politician?

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Where I live in Western Australia, I see little evidence of anthropogenic climate change but significant impacts from natural climate change such as reduced rainfall that is identical to rainfall 100+ years ago. More importantly, while I accept that humans are changing the climate thanks to higher levels of CO2, articles like this one which deliberately (in my view) constrain their period of research such that they are guaranteed to get the answer they want should be criticised and I would be grateful if you respond to this issue rather than focus on the person making the criticism.

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BM: "...articles like this one which deliberately (in my view) constrain their period of research such that they are guaranteed to get the answer they want.."

"In your view?" Why don't you ask Zeke? He's right here! What on earth makes you think he wanted to get the answer he got?That's a pretty serious accusation, tantamount to claiming fraud. Do you know any published scientists personally? Zeke is trained by recognized experts not to fool himself; and disciplined by those same experts, Dr. Trenberth among them, every time he submits a paper for publication, or even posts a blog article! You've got some chutzpah, Mr. Masters. Zeke can speak for himself, of course, but if he doesn't, somebody should!

And the conceit that your personal observation of your part of Australia somehow contradicts Zeke's professional analysis, is pretty embarrassing to you too. But dream on.

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Z.H. explains he is looking at strong El Niño phenomena and why - Earth hasn't cooled as expected after the recent phenomenon. What answer did he get you didn't like?

Incidentally, the Guardian only reports what it reads - usually with links - it doesn't make stuff up.

You just don't like what you read. You can't see what is happening in Australia? Good gracious, I can see it from here! (Auckland.)

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So please tell me what you think is happening here in Australia?

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Keep the mallet handy, Dennis. I predict BM, as an undisguised pseudoskeptic, will keep up the argument from ignorance no matter how many expert rebuttals you link.

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You seem not to have remembered what I wrote above, namely, that where I live in Western Australia, we are back to the same rainfall levels as 100+ years ago. So the CSIRO report on farmers responding to a 100 year rainfall decline has little to do with climate change.. But thanks for the link anyway.

More significantly, in 1976, there was a major change in weather patterns affecting Western Australia, which pushed the rain-bearing cold fronts south by about 100km. This was almost certainly brought on by climate change (so, no, I am not a denier, just a skeptic of some aspects of the current hysteria).

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